Ship-of-Fools relaunches Church of Fools – St. Pixels

Ship-of-Fools gained quite a bit of attention when it launched the first 3D online church in May 2005. With luminary guests and the usual technical quirks such as the guest speakers avatar disappearing, which led the Bishop of London to step up - the Church of Fools became a popular environment. And, sadly a bit of an expensive one, but one a great deal was learned from.

It has re-launched (reappeared) as St. Pixels – the 3D environment isn’t up yet and the site will be officially christiened June 12-14th.

From Dave Walker of The Cartoon Blog:

One of the first features on the site is a debate on Mission-Shaped Church featuring emerging church guru (my description) Brian McLaren. “As well as the weekly discussion questions there will also be an “Ask Brian” thread.” The site also has blogs and of course the actual church simulation bit where you wander round as a pixellated being. I’m not sure whether that is up and running yet or not.

You may remember the Church of Fools in its original form from a year or two ago. It was very popular but proved too expensive to keep going as I recall. The Methodist Church supported it then and is supporting it again. ‘Hurrah for the Methodists!’ as I often say. (People look at me oddly.)

I wish Simon and Steve all the best in this venture. I’m sure they’ll get plenty of media coverage as they usually do. The only slight comment I’d make is that the design could possibly be worked upon slightly, which I suspect they are planning to do. I thought the old ‘Church of Fools’ design was top notch but the new one looks a tiny bit… brown. But perhaps brown is fashionable.